Thursday, June 28, 2012

another awesome pinterest find... i think they were a hit (they sure did disappear fast!) of course i made them when i knew there would be plenty of people to share with. i'm also pretty excited because i love shortbread cookies in general and i never knew they were so easy to make! this recipe made roughly 2 dozen cookies.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

well, mama did a bad thing. i may have switched marvin k mooney the fish into a new home without prepping said new home very well first. needless to say, he didn't survive. so i discovered him at night and dumped buried him into the compost. his fish hotel was in the kitchen sink. when saraya came downstairs, she proceeded to give mkm the standard morning greeting but looked confused that he wasn't there. here's how the conversation went...

me: sorry baby but marvin k mooney is gone.
S: marvin k mooney fish went away!
me: yes. and he won't be back. but we can get a new fish, okay?
S: ok!
me: what color do you want your new fish to be?
S: pink!
me: haha, okay i will try. what should we name the new fish?
S: marvin k mooney!
me: i think we should pick a different name. a new name for a new fish?
S: no, marvin k mooney fish
me: how about toodles?
S: oh toooodles! (anyone who has seen mickey mouse clubhouse will get this)

so we have a new fish. he is pink-ish. and his name is toodles. and yes, i prepped the water right this time (i think).

instacanv.as is an awesome site where you can buy your favorite instagram photos as canvas art from artists around the world. i'm excited to announce that yours truly has opened a gallery! artists/photographers earn 20% of the sale. i don't expect to make much money on my instagram photos but there are some photos i've taken that i would love to blow up on canvas. there are also some friends with amazing art on their instagrams too that i think would make perfect canvas displays in our home.

so if you're feeling the urge to support me while displaying my creativity on your walls, check out my gallery! and thank you!

Monday, June 25, 2012

this weekend we checked out the san diego county fair and went to the beach 2 days in a row. busy but fun and kind of relaxing...

making sandy beats

sand castle builder

relaxing mama

sand crabs!

she liked putting the sand crabs on top of the castle

admiring one of the amazing wood displays

love this...

tons of pretty stones like this

and glow in the dark ones too! i imagine that top left one as krytponite.

sifting for stone treasures

it's not the fair without fried food! pictured here, kool-aid and avaocado. yes, deep-fried kool-aid. we thought it was pretty good! i didn't have room for red velvet funnel cake but it looked amazing too.

waiting to see the baby elephants

she won this snake on the midway and was so happy she had to give it a big hug

last year we enjoyed the fair but the traffic and parking was so horrendous that i seriously doubted we go again this year. so i was pleasantly surprised to find out that they were running a special with public transit. it was super cheap to take a round-trip train ride with admission to the fair included. so a train ride for the little ones, no traffic or parking hassles, AND discountes fares?! that was the best and easiest decision i made all weekend.

Thursday, June 21, 2012

in case you missed yesterday's post on DIY guitar picks,here it is. this was just one ofmanyprojects i've pinned to try myself. i make an effort not to pin everything in sight and then never get around to attempting to actually make it. i'm happy to say i've done a pretty good job of making the projects i've bookmarked such as the picks, my necklace holder, the scarf holder, theearring display, and more. i still have a lot of untried projects sitting on my "she's crafty" and "interesting/useful" boards though so i thought i'd share some of them. hopefully that will be a little extra motivation to move more of these into the tried and finished column...

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

i found a tutorial through pinterest for making your own guitar picks and thought it would be a great project for saraya to make some for justin. it was one of the fastest, easiest (and sweetest!) projects we've done to date. we made these for father's day but i had to wait to post the tutorial so he wouldn't see them before he got them. :)

2. use a copy machine and enlarge 250% (we used our all-in-one but you can also take it to kinkos or thelibrary and use their machine)

3. use the enlargement as a template to trace onto the plastic

4. let the little ones color (i colored a sheet too)

5. cut out the picks and lay on a sheet of foil

6. put it in the oven at 325 degrees for 2-3 min

the original tutorial i followed said that the heat will make them curl up but that they'll flatten out during the shrinking process. you can see that a couple of ours curled up and didn't flatten out. i'm not sure why but 2 out of 10 isn't bad! and while i don't recommend burning plastic on a regular basis, this was such a small and quick project that there were no noticeable fumes. just for extra precautions i did this part with the window open while she napped far away from the kitchen. when she woke up and saw the finished project she exclaimed "mama made them tiny!"